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Yes, you are. Bud's is almost local for me, but just far enough to make the gas prohibitively expensive. Must be a real treat though.
But wait, what's that... ? Oh, you say Bud's is a brick and mortar store too? So they have those costs, in addition to the online set-up? Hmm, maybe it is possible, for people who actually know something about running a business, to offer good prices, good products, and good services.
I dont think you get how much volume bud's does to be able to offer much lower prices. Bud's sells gun for less then a local small dealer can buy them for wholesale. A local gun store can't compete against large volume sellers like these huge online distributors. If you have a business in which your competitor can offer a product to the public for less then you pay for it you've got some problems. The only thing a gun shop can really do is offer better service, and gun smithing.
My reply to the person who posted that would have been:
1. I guess you build all of your guns in house, except the ones that people transfer? Surely you deal with these people anyway?
2. OMG, not a whole 15 second phone call!
3. Like any other gun.
4. Thats some hard stuff there
5. Wow, another minute of your life gone.
6. Like you would for any other gun sale, a whopping two to three minutes.
7.Really, because of transfers? Thats BS.
8. Because of transfers?
9. Awww, poor baby. Thats part of business.
10. See number 9.
11. See number 10.
12. Wow, not another minute of your life wasted?
It just kills me to hear dealers complain about doing transfers. Gun shops are truly their own enemies. The reason most go under is because of complaining, overcharging, and general bad attitude.
Yeah, just like any other gun, except now instead of for $100 it's for $20.
And $20 isn't enough money for the time involved and it won't pay the bills. Now you understand why many successful shops don't want to be bothered with numerous transfers. There isn't enough money in it to pay the overhead and still make a profit.
You can't fight reality.
Would one of my regular shops rather do a transfer for pocket change or sell another Cooper to their best Cooper customer? Duh. The last time I ran into the guy he had already purchased 17 Coopers. Who knows how many he has now.
I know some people can't afford an extra $30 or $50 for a gun, but that's not everybody and face it, it's the people with too much money who buy the expensive guns.
Do you think they want to keep repeat customer with deep pockets waiting for service while they do a $20 or $40 transfer? Nope.
I'm not even a real big spender. Over the weekend a shop was slammed with customers and the 3 registers at the gun counter had lines and they were sending folks over to the registers in the fishing section, but one sales guy stood at the counter and talked to me for a good ten minutes and it wasn't even mostly about guns. We were just visiting and catching up on news. But I've been going there for nearly 40 years and they know that sooner or later they'll get some more of my money. What do they want him to do, a little PR to get more of my money or a $40 transfer?
A dealer on the other forum I mentioned earlier doesn't like transfers (for many of the above reasons) and he keeps a list of places that do like to do them so he can refer his customers somewhere.
The bottom line is that gun store owners need people to buy guns, accessories, etc from people more than people need to buy guns, accessories, etc from a specific gun store owner. So, if customers can get stuff cheaper elsewhere (ie - internet), it behoove gun store owners to go out of their way to get customers to buy from them or else they will go out of business
There's too many places to buy guns on the cheap to be an ass and try to get a huge margin on them without offering some other incentive.
As a small business owner I find that the biggest problem with the small gun stores is that they are owned and ran by guys who love guns and get into the business because they want to make a living and have fun. They're not dedicated businessmen who can detach themselves for their own good. This is a common factor among hobby type businesses.
That said I'm always shocked at the number of people who continue to shop in stores and pay more when it's way more cost effective and faster to do it on the net.
ETA Anyone who's familiar with the Denver Metro area gun dealers can tell you that in less than three years we've lost Rob's, Dave's, two Gander Mountains, the store on Federal, several pawns, and we're on the verge of losing a few more all in the middle of the largest gun boom this country has seen since the government was buying every weapon it could in WWII. That means they either couldn't compete or didn't know what they were doing.
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Just 'cause you say on the net how you can lay a beating on Lesner doesn't make it so.
We can forgive a child who's afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.
I have been frustrated in the past by the attitude of local gunshops when asked about accepting transfers from internet sales. They feel like you are taking money out of their pocket. I try to look at things from their point of view - and I can somewhat see their point. It's their gunshop, not mine.
What I have done is to try to find FTF local deals on internet forums and have pretty much taken the gunshops and sales tax out of the equation.
Seems like there is substantial demand for these services judging by the activity in these type threads on many different forums - but few folks are willing to 'put their money where their mouth is' and open a gunshop so they could run it 'their way'. I mean, it's pretty simple, isn't it?
I imagine the gun trade would loose some of it's luster if you were depending on it to put food on the table, a roof over your head and put your kids thru school, etc. It's serious business, just like any other, and every penny counts. I would imagine that most of the gunshops we mention here have been in business for many years, so they must be doing something right.
Vote with your dollars and spend your money somewhere else.
And $20 isn't enough money for the time involved and it won't pay the bills. Now you understand why many successful shops don't want to be bothered with numerous transfers. There isn't enough money in it to pay the overhead and still make a profit.
You can't fight reality.
Would one of my regular shops rather do a transfer for pocket change or sell another Cooper to their best Cooper customer? Duh. The last time I ran into the guy he had already purchased 17 Coopers. Who knows how many he has now.
I know some people can't afford an extra $30 or $50 for a gun, but that's not everybody and face it, it's the people with too much money who buy the expensive guns.
John
The problem with this, from an Econ standpoint, is that you're assuming that, at every point in the day, there's a high-profit gun sale to transact in place of the 15 minutes it takes to do a transfer.
Maybe that's true in some high-volume shops, and if so, a no-transfer policy would make good business sense.
In the OP shop, however, and most of the shops I frequent, the guy behind the counter spends 90% of his day scratching his a**, watching fox news, and trading conspiracy theories with unemployed hangers-on.
You're telling me that guy couldn't make a little scratch off of 10-15 transfers a week?
For all those who have defended this attitude, can you imagine finding this sign at ANY other establishment? Would it make you want to patronize them?
Even small businesses that are forced to charge marginally higher prices don't brag about the fact, and tell you it's their way or the highway. They do everything they can to make up for it in quality and service.
Maybe there's a lesson there somewhere?
Now that's a good point. The local hardware doesn't have one up because he can't sell lumber cheaper than Home Depot; no sign at the local car lot because he can't beat out Carmax; Target doesn't have a sign because shirts are a dollar higher than Wally sells them for. To be honest the only reason a lot of FFLs exist is due to the .gov regulating transfers through FFL licenses. If this artificial market restriction was ever removed and anyone could buy and sell new firearms for profit I think many would sink instead of swim. No matter what you are selling, the business always needs customers more than customers need the business. Some people would do well to remember that.
I won't buy from a gun store who refuses to do transfers, end of story. I no longer even go to my local gun store, but that's because it's ran by trashy pricks. I drive 35-40 minutes to go to a store I like.
The store I go, everyone is nice, but the owner can be crabby. The last time I ordered something from Bud's, he happened to be the one to check me out at the register, and he mumbled something about it being cheaper than what he can order it for, but aside from that, no problems.
I DO buy surplus military guns from them, but like many of you, they're waaay overpriced on new guns. Like, not even competitive. Sorry, but I'm not spending $125 more on something just to buy it locally. They gladly take my $20 transfer fee ($30 for new guns,) and everyone is happy.
At least the last couple of times I've went in, they haven't been pushing me to buy ammo "because Obama plans on raising ammo prices by 800 percent, and I need to buy what I need now." That was their story all last year.
I think Glock Talkers are more price sensitive than the average gun shop customer. After all, Gander Mountain is still in business.
I feel sorry for the people who go into Gander Mountain and buy guns, not knowing any better. They sell all their USED inventory at new or HIGHER prices. It's amazing.
Aside from maybe the rare sale, virtually and literally EVERY SINGLE ITEM in Gander Mountain is overpriced. From clothes, to guns, to ammo, to recreation. Everything sold by Gander Mountain can be bought cheaper elsewhere.
At least Dick's has competitive deals on new guns.
Tell that to the guys that go out of business for behaving like that.
I disagree, I have been in business for myself. I owned my own, successful, auto repair shop. I also didnt gouge my customers and complain about them only wanting an oil change instead of an entire engine. Justify your own problems with serving customers, but dont complain that you dont make any money on transfers. Get rich on every customer, huh?
No that is not at all what I was saying, there is a fair price for everthing. Im just saying that I would indeed do transfers if it were my gun shop but I would cover all of my over head and make a profit on the transfer. Just as I would if I were selling one of my own products. That has nothing to do with price gouging...completely justifiable cost.
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